A near-eye display (also termed as a near-to-eye display) device is a type of novel wearable device that creates a display in front of a user's field of vision. On the display, various digital contents, received and provided from an external device such as a smart phone, a tablet or a notebook computer, including images, graphics, web pages, emails and digital maps can be shown. The imaging display utilized in a near-eye display device may be transparent or opaque. Depending on the display type, the device is generally categorized into two major types, which one is a transparent type device while another is an opaque-type device.
For an opaque-type device, an opaque display is used in the device and shows digital contents to a user. The opaque-type device can use the conventional liquid crystal panel as the opaque display and is much easier to create an immersive theater-like digital content to users as compared with the transparent type device. The opaque-type near-eye display device is often applied as a tool to realize a virtual reality technology. As to a transparent type device, a see-through type display, which allows a user to see the reality world through a transparent display while in the meantime the digital contents shows on the transparent display, is used in the device. The transparent type near-eye display device is often applied as a tool to realize an augmented reality technology. Visually the reality world seems to act as a background, while the transparent display shows contents.
In particular to a transparent type device, the most famous transparent type device product definitely is the Google glass. The Google glass develops a basic structure for the transparent type near-eye display device, which structure becomes very popular in the state of the art. The structure typically consists of a spectacle-like frame and a see-through display mounted to the frame. The near-eye display device employs a regular optical system as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 8,767,305 to act as the optical system. This optical system is configured to have an optical imaging engine, a polarizing beam splitter and a concave reflector. Usually, the optical imaging scheme is technically divided into two kinds of major imaging technologies, which one is a liquid crystal on silicon (“LCOS”) based technology and another is a digital light processing (“DLP”) based technology. The optical imaging engine generates a light beam containing digital contents to be shown on the display and transmits it to the splitter and the reflector. Finally the digital contents are reflected into the user's eyes and a magnified virtual image is reimaged in front of user's eyes.
However, the transparent type device still has multiple defects and shortages which cause inconveniences to a user. For instances, the near-eye display device is bounded to the spectacle frame having a style that may be unsuitable for the user or the user may dislike. In some occasions, although the device uses a see-through display, the digital contents shown on the transparent display may partly block or shelter user's eyesight, since the display is configured right in front of the user' eyes and the line of user's eyesight. While the device is in use, the partial block to the eyesight from the transparent display leads to a safety issue, particularly when a user is in movement or walk. Furthermore, as if a user moves, she/he must continuously need orientation guidance or route navigation, especially provided from such a near-eye display device.
There is a need to solve the above deficiencies/issues.